Hello Mount Rainier!
Three years ago John and I hiked up to Camp Muir to get a sense of the mountain. We have been hiking and climbing to state highpoints, and we knew we'd like to climb Mount Rainier eventually. It became clear that as massive as this mountain looks from a distance, it's no less intimidating from up close.
We weren't ready. We determined that we needed more training, more experience, and definitely more people on the rope with us. Oh, and along the way, more gear (I'm not sure why, but that I think gear shopping is fun).
Finally the timing worked out that we were back in Washington state in August. I knew I most needed to feel comfortable with all the technical aspects. John was focused on the physical training. Both were going well, with MAA climbs, time on Mount Shasta, scrambling at Castle Rock, and lots of hilly hikes wearing big packs.
I went all-in on training classes with
International Mountain Guides at Mount Rainier. Jason flew in for the crevasse rescue class, and the rest of our team would be there for training and prep starting the following Monday.
Our guides Kevin and Harry were great! They took turns teaching us skills and techniques, giving us gear tips and hands-on practice, and they were super-patient with all my questions. I had learned (and read about) just enough going in that I had a ton of questions. Different books would have different opinions about how things should be done, and one of the biggest takeaways was that you should understand the "why" of everything you were doing. Then you can apply it to each specific situation. There is no one simple answer in mountaineering, it's much more of a thinking sport than I had realized. So now I appreciate it even more.
Harry demonstrating trekking pole length for mountaineering:
Day 1 hike up to find some snow to practice on:
I kept getting distracted by the views:
Mountaineering Day School - the basics of walking on snow slopes, self-arrest, cramponing, and roping up. Mostly review for me, but I learned a few things and it was especially good to get the self-arrest techniques fresh in my mind.
Ready to get started:
A nice slope with easy runout:
New crampons (oh, and pants, oh, and backpack... at least I've worn the boots a few times, and the gaiters I've had forever...) - another good use for the class, test out all the new stuff:
Harry explaining something to an attentive class:
Practicing walking on rope:
Heading up to the top of the slope to pop out on the trail:
Day 2 (Advanced Mountaineering Day School), and more amazing views:
We started working on knots, building on that training over the next couple days:
We also began working with anchors, a key piece of crevasse rescue:
An even more beautiful day up on the mountain, with most of the upper level wildfire smoke clearing temporarily:
Waterfall across the way:
OK, back to work. Kevin and Harry lowered us each in turn over the edge of a small drop-off, and we used our crampons and ice axes to climb back up.
They assured us that we wouldn't run into anything near this steep during our actual climb:
Good practice on the steep snow and being belayed:
I was interested in their anchors:
One rope for belaying (the top one, with a Munter hitch) and the other one is Kevin's anchor rope (the bottom one, with a clove hitch). If I'm remembering that right.
Still a bit of haze in the distance:
Hello, marmots!
Next up was the weekend Crevasse Rescue class. Good stuff! I had some experience with aspects of the Mountaineering Day School going in, but with crevasse rescue I had mostly just been doing a lot of reading. It rapidly became complicated with all the different types of setups, and I was having trouble keeping everything straight. Let's find a system that we can remember and make it work.
First things first, a bunch of practice with knots. John, Jason, and I had practiced with knots during the drive to/from Mount Shasta and I was glad to have a lot of it down already. That way I could learn some new things and not feel overwhelmed.
An autoblock, similar in use to a prusik hitch:
Kevin demonstrating self-rescue for climbing yourself out of a crevasse. I was surprised at how easy it was to make this work, after struggling with various ascending systems for adventure racing. I think it makes a big difference that you're not trying to efficiently ascent several hundred feet, only several 10's. This was a good confidence booster.
We spent a good amount of time working with anchor systems, focusing on the SERENA acronym - Strong, Equalized, Redundant, Efficient, No extension, low Angle:
Harry giving us a chance to show what we know (and don't know) about the ratios of haul systems:
The class focused on a 3:1 haul, similar to what we've previously learned for whitewater training, so I had at least seen it created by our team for skills checks. We've even used it in a 7:1 configuration to
pull a Sampan canoe out of a river in Borneo, so I was confident in our adventure racing team. Now I just had to make sure I could create one of these all by myself.
And... talk about distractions, I just reread my Eco-Challenge race report. That race was the hardest thing I've ever done in my life (by far). Interesting the pieces that I've forgotten over time. And I suppose it shouldn't surprise me that I'm still annoyed about losing our bailer (yes, 18 years later; it was a stupid milk jug, get over it). That was quite an adventure! It set us on a course to be with teammates on Mount Rainier, very thankful for our lives!
Even if you don't read the report (it's long, I don't blame you, or perhaps you've read it before), here are some
photos from the race.
Anyhoo, here's part of the crevasse rescue system, using an optional ATC to keep the prusik tended:
Jason carrying assorted ropes and gear back to the platform tents - we each rented one of these to stay in for several days, totally awesome by the way:
Last (and best) class day was back up on the mountain. Harry and Kevin put everything together and set us up to rescue each other at the same location as the "ice climb" on Friday. We took turns "falling" off the edge (with backup from the guides) while another on our team self-arrested to stop the fall, then we set up a 3:1 haul system to bring that person up.
Excellent practice on all counts, from understanding how a real self-arrest might work to hold a teammate, to getting a really good idea just how difficult solo crevasse rescue would be (build an anchor while in self-arrest position, really?), to practicing the crevasse rescue setup several times.
After taking my turn jumping off the edge, I spent my time dangling from the rope calling "I'm OK, I think I can ascend up the rope" while Kevin would tell me "no, you're supposed to be hurt, stay down there." I took the time to practice a bit of ascending anyway :) but went back to hanging from the rope so my teammates could rescue me.
Suggested picket for building mountaineering anchors - a Yates with reinforcement at the top instead of the ones we have that will get beat all to heck if we ever did need to actually use them:
Luckily we got to witness Jason's team doing one of the last rescues of the afternoon so I could document parts of it. His teammate (who was one of the larger guys in the class) was hesitant about stepping off the edge, so we encouraged him while Jason got ready to self-arrest.
Something told me I should switch to video... so now we have this awesome documentation of the event (highly recommended watching):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnu1VAYAPFg&feature=youtu.be
Jason was among those laughing the whole time, amazingly he still managed an excellent self-arrest (once his body returned to the snow).
Setting up the anchor near a grinning Jason:
Almost ready to transfer the weight off from Jason onto the anchor:
Adding a prusik hitch to the rope:
The weight is now on the rope and Jason can get up from the snow:
Checking on the fallen climber and preparing the lip with an ice axe to keep the rope from undercutting any further into the snow/ice:
Setting up the 3:1 Z-drag:
Jason hauling while Kevin tends the prusik:
Pull, Jason!
It took several passes but eventually the rescue was a success!
A couple more things to try, a direct haul (if you have a lot of people around, everyone grabs the rope and pulls) and a drop-loop 2:1 system, which might be what they are testing here:
Kristina took this excellent class photo at the end - thank you Kristina!
I got so much out of these classes. Big thank you to Harry and Kevin and IMG!
Now hopefully I'll remember enough of it and can decipher my notes well enough to record the important details for future reference. A lot has happened since then... (to be continued)
